


now your life's no longer empty, surely heaven waits for you

by transishimaru



Category: Dangan Ronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
Genre: Alternate Universe, Demons, Djinni & Genies, Hunter AU, M/M, Memory Loss, Supernatural AU - Freeform, Trans Female Character, Tumblr: Ishimondo Week, angel au, ishimondoweek2019, suicidal ideation (not graphic)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2021-01-21 02:35:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21292220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/transishimaru/pseuds/transishimaru
Summary: Mondo didn't ask for a self-appointed guardian angel, but that's sure as shit what he got.Supernatural AU forishimondo week.(tags will be updated as the week progresses!)
Relationships: Ishimaru Kiyotaka/Oowada Mondo
Comments: 10
Kudos: 57





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I know I said I wasn't going to do ishimondo week, but then I started thinking about this AU that was initially just for jokes before it kinda spiraled out of control. And, uh, since I don't really have the attention span at the moment (life is just like that!) or muse to do several different prompts, I just kinda took the "Ishimaru-as-an-Angel" prompt and ran with it for all 7 days.
> 
> You don't have to know anything about _Supernatural_ to read this, although I guess it sort of helps. In the event that you do know about _Supernatural_, either from watching it yourself or through cultural osmosis, I have more set up in my head than what is going to be mentioned or even referenced here so I guess you can hit me up on my [tumblr](https://gayishimaru.tumblr.com) about it.
> 
> I should also mention - and I can't believe that in the year of our lord Luigi 2019, that I have to say this - that in this fic, Chihiro is written as a trans girl, and if you don't like that then you shouldn't read it. If you decide to read it anyway, keep your comments about that to yourself, because any comments referencing your distaste for it will be deleted regardless of whatever cisplaining or flattery accompanies it. 
> 
> (Fic title - ["Carry On Wayward Son" by Kansas](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2X_2IdybTV0))

His hands are shaking and he knows he’s not doing this right, too rushed and too antsy. If Daiya was here he’d tell him to cool down, slow down, treat his weapons as good as he does his bike or it’ll backfire on him. But after what he’s been through, the past six and a half months – however long it was, so easy to lose track of time _there_ – it’s probably more than just understandable that he’s jittery.

His phone vibrates on the bedside table and he almost throws it or the rifle in his hands across the room in his rush to read the screen.

> _No updates – M. _

“Fuck.” Chihiro’s looking at him from her spot at the table, fingers hovering over the keys so she can pretend to type when Mondo’s frenzied and unfocused gaze drops on her. He knows she’s got something she wants to say and can see her chewing on it through her lips. She wants to tell him to calm down too.

But that’s easy for her to say. For once, she’s not the one being hunted.

“You found anything?” he asks, and he knows his tone is accusatory but it’d be nice if someone, somewhere, gave him some goddamn information on what it is chasing after him instead of looking at him like he’s losing his damn mind for being understandably freaked out. She sticks her thumb in her mouth to chew on the nail and hums, eyes back down at the computer, actually doing research this time.

Another ten or so minutes goes by and Mondo thinks his heart rate might actually be approaching normal. Not that he thinks this dingy hotel room offers much in the way of protection, but the longer he goes without another attack of _whatever_ the more time he has to think of a solution to this problem he’s unintentionally created.

Which is when Chihiro says it. “Have you tried just talking to… uhm, ‘it’?”

If she thinks he’s calm now – if he thinks he calm now, or thought he was, well they’re both wrong and now it shows. The word _no_ snaps out of his chest so loudly it almost seems to echo on the walls, sticking to the tacky vinyl wallpaper.

Chihiro’s gotten braver in the time he’s been AWOL. She doesn’t shrink back as much, she just looks exasperated. Which is what he gets for leaving her with Daiya in that time frame. “Mondo, you don’t even know what it wants. Maybe it just –“

“What? Wants ta fuckin’ chat? I don’t think so, Chi.” The words he thinks, the _You’re-Not-Cut-Out-For-This_ don’t need to be said for Chihiro to hear them, feel them. And it’s not like she hasn’t proven her worth out here, or anything. Saying them to her now would be cruel and unjustified, but there’s still some doubt in Mondo’s mind about how long she’ll be able to do this. For all of her strengths, her intelligence, the vast improvement she’s made, she’s still so soft. Maybe not everything needs to die by fire, but most things do.

She shakes her head, rolls her eyes, tapping through whatever webpage she’s on. He wonders if she’d rather have partnered with his brother and left Michi here with him. She might be more comfortable with solitary research than investigation on foot, but Mondo is difficult to handle.

(Too difficult to handle. That’s how he got here in the first place.)

He hears Chihiro sigh and his eyes go back to her, teeth embedded in his cheek. He knows he should apologize, but she’s giving him the impression of someone who’s already forgotten about the incident and started to move on. Her nails scratch at her scalp, scowling at the computer screen. She starts to say, “How about – “ and gets cut off.

It’s happening. Again.

Mondo wishes he could see, both for the smug satisfaction of _‘I TOLD you I wasn’t making it up!’_ and just so he could, in general, see. He doesn’t even know what to call this feeling. It’s like a migraine, but worse. Maybe closer to what he’d always thought a lobotomy might feel like. He’ll be surprised when its over (if it even ends) if his ears, his nose, his eyes aren’t bleeding. He’s aware, somehow, of the glass being blown out and he tries to feel around to make sure Chihiro’s away from the window. He thinks he hears her scream, but it’s hard to tell over the white noise and radio static ringing in his head.

Then it just stops, again. Sudden, and dizzying.

For a minute he can’t breathe. He chokes when he tries to call for Chihiro, shaking again from somewhere on the floor, waiting for the dust to clear from his eyes.

She’s the one to help him stand up, vision coming back to him in small increments as she drags a finger across his line of sight. He’s got a concussion, probably, but they’ve got bigger problems to deal with than that. Once his ears stop ringing she asks him, “Is _that_ what you were talking about?!”

“Yeah.” He can feel blood drying in the back of his throat.

She looks around the room, lip split open, surveying the damage. Even to her, there’s too much broken to try and repair. She gets back to him, eyes wide and breath ragged. “We need to get somewhere with better infrastructure.”

* * *

They don’t tell Daiya what they’re doing because Daiya would, rightfully, tell them it’s a terrible idea and race to the makeshift bomb shelter and tell them to knock it the fuck off. Michi’s aware, only because he’s great at keeping secrets and just as much a bad influence on Chihiro as Mondo has been. And, since he’s with Daiya at the moment, he can keep him occupied until they’ve caught the bastard or bitch or fucker that wrecked a perfectly good hotel room and incredibly expensive laptop. Which Mondo likes to think Chihiro cares about a little less than she cares about him.

Her sigils are much more practiced and orderly than his are. If they were being graded on exactness, her marks would be higher, but even before he dropped out of high school Mondo didn’t care much about grades. He cares about catching this thing, whatever it is, and sending it (back) to Hell.

The shiver that runs over his spine is entirely involuntary. He hasn’t even thought the word since he visited, for want of a better term. Going back isn’t exactly high on his to-do list. He can even see why so many demons try to escape it, and maybe if they didn’t insist on being such dicks here on Earth he wouldn’t revoke their visa with such a passion. Which might be another reason the whatever-it-is is coming after him now.

T-minus twelve seconds, and it would be easier to summon this thing if he had any clue what it was or what it was called. Michi said something about Daiya running out to scout a psychic for them to visit, but the last one they talked to ended up dead in her own bathroom and Mondo’s not looking to repeat the scenario. He doesn’t give himself over to empathy as often as Chihiro says he should, but the rage radiating in Makoto’s parting words hurt more than the injuries he sustained the whole case, and he got shot. Twice.

Chihiro doesn’t make it past the first couple lines of the text before the door is blown open. It’s overly dramatic and looks a little ridiculous, and Mondo wants to laugh to assert dominance but he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t at least a little intimidated. The person who comes through certainly doesn’t look that tough, but he’s had the shit kicked out of him by demons inhabiting the bodies of pop stars.

Whatever it is – whatever _he_ is – he’s dressed a little too formal, except for these weird knee-high boots. He doesn’t even take note of Chihiro behind him, scrambling for the gun. She takes unsteady aim and takes a shot, but the rock salt bullet must miss him entirely because he doesn’t react like he’s been hit. He does pause, and for a moment Mondo thinks he’s gotten caught up in one of the eighteen different traps they’ve laid out, but he walks through the circle to where Chihiro’s trying to reload.

_Mistake number one, should not have brought her with me_ – and not because she’s a liability but because the situation is a liability to her. They’re always after Chihiro, after what she represents or was gifted or whatever. It’s hard to make his limbs move fast enough to get over to her so Mondo winds up watching, helpless, as the supernatural entity of unknown origin touches her temple and she passes out cold.

“Hey,” Mondo snaps, never good with his temper or impulses, “She better not be dead!”

There’s something like recognition in whatever-he-is’ eyes, bright red and eerie. But since Chihiro’s on the ground knocked out (just knocked out, Mondo won’t let himself think of the alternative) there’s no one stopping him from plunging the most powerful knife they’ve got into this guy’s chest.

…there should be fading. The recognition should be gone and there should be light, blue or yellow or _something_, screaming and smoke and ethereal inhabitant of this vessel eradicated while the body bleeds out on the floor, but all the guy does is look at the knife in his shoulder with his obnoxiously large eyebrows furrowed, scowling at it. He looks back at Mondo, recognition now the same flavor of irritated everyone else who knows him wears. “That was unnecessary, and _rude_,” he says. He puts one hand on the hilt of the knife and pulls it out. No tensing. No blood. No sign of pain or injury anywhere.

That weapon has killed hundreds of demons, and this guy, whatever he is, drops it in the dirt like it’s a butter knife.

Mondo doesn’t know how to feel about that.

He starts to open his mouth and Mondo’s brain panics, blurting out what he probably should have started out with if he really wanted to buy some time, since all stabbing did was make him mad: “What are you?”

The look on the thing’s face tells Mondo he’s just itching to give him some kind of lecture, but he manages to hold off, arms too still at his side. “Angel.”

“That’s nice,” Mondo says, “But I didn’t ask for a fuckin’ name. I said, ‘_What_ are you?’”

His face just must be stuck like that. “That _is_ what I am,” he responds. “An angel.”

Despite the imminent and probably major danger Mondo is in, he can’t help but snort as he tries to create a makeshift plan B. “Yeah, right. ‘Cause those are an actual thing.”

He hopes the way his eyes dart around the room for a solution is subtler than it feels. _Salt on the windows didn’t work, rock salt bullet didn’t work, devil’s trap didn’t work, demon blade didn’t work. Daiya’s got the Colt. Guess I’ll have to try silver bullets–_ “Didn’t you do your research?”

Oh, no. He didn’t take that crap in high school and he’s sure as hell not to take it now, not from some supposed ‘angel’ here to kill him. “Get bent, asshole,” he sneers, “Ya broke the fuckin’ computer.”

The angel's face goes through confusion and what Mondo guesses passes for regret before his eyes flutter shut and he sighs.

Well, sort of. It comes out more like a groan. “Yes, well. I have been told I’m too loud, but I thought that was mere exaggeration.”

Mondo wants to respond with a snappy comeback, but can’t seem to reach one. He’s not even sure what that means. His mind falls flat on a “Right,” unnerved by the thing’s gaining proximity. “And whats’a ‘angel’ want with me, exactly?”

And there it goes, right back to mad again. So Celes was right, and Mondo does just have that effect on everyone – heavenly bodies too, if this guy’s telling the truth. “You would know that, if you’d just answered my call.”

“Your _call?!_” He’s got another half dozen retorts coming, but it’s like he swallows something on the breath in and it hits him. He thinks he’s heard people say this – Christians, or people who just really dig the aesthetic. Saying that they receive calls or orders or something from a god. “Dammit.” His nervous twitches beg for him to put his fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck, but he’d hate to be caught vulnerable right now. “The deafening noise, the blinding light – that shit was you?”

If this guy was human, Mondo would say he looks kind of hurt. He doesn’t buy the whole ‘angel’ thing, but how he stands, unnaturally straight and stiff, and the color of his eyes…

Well, he could be like Celes, and just wearing contacts. “I thought you’d be able to handle my true form.” At least he doesn’t sound angry this time. “You could before.”

He doesn’t believe in kismet, old souls or reincarnations. And there’s no way he’s met this guy before – he’s been a lot of places and killed a lot of things, and he remembers all of it, sometimes in too-vivid detail. If they’d met on a case, Mondo would have remembered it. There’s no way he’d forget someone like this.

_So why does he feel familiar?_


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning in this chapter for vomit, not very descriptive but it's there!
> 
> i use the term _folie a deux_ in here, which is "a madness shared by two;" [it's phenomenon wherein, supposedly, two people experience the same delusion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folie_%C3%A0_deux). it's also the title of a fall out boy album, but used here it's a reference to a season 5 episode of the x-files.

He can tell Chihiro is laughing at him about this. That’s the reaction he’s focusing on because Michi is trying very hard not to have a reaction at all, and Daiya is furious. In a way, he’s thankful Michi is more or less staying out of it, but it’s also frustrating because he’s the sanest one in the group at the moment and he could use an objective opinion about the whole thing. Of course, it’d be great if he could get that from Chihiro, because she’s the only other person who’s even come close to meeting Ishi – as Mondo has decided to call him. It’s not his “true name,” and Mondo’s not even sure where he picked it up from. He remembers it like part of a word, maybe in that whole lesson the weirdo tried to give him on the classes of angels. But his “true name” was long and difficult to pronounce, so now he’s stuck with this moniker the same way Mondo’s apparently stuck with him.

Objectively speaking? He guesses it is pretty funny. He’s the last guy he’d expect to have a self-appointed guardian angel, too. But none of that explains to him _why_ he’s the person that got one, and Ishi has been pretty damn vague about the whole thing.

It would also help a hell of a lot of Ishi would actually show up when other people are around, instead of waiting until Mondo is alone. Chihiro’s seen the whole world-ending shitshow that is Ishi trying to show up or talk in his “true form” and got about a ten-second glimpse of him in his vessel before she passed out, so naturally Daiya and Michi think they came down with a case of _folie a deux_. For reasons that are probably pretty obvious, Mondo doesn’t wanna go back to the psych ward.

For now, he’s just keeping his mouth shut.

“Hello, Mondo.” Or not. He’d like to say he doesn’t jump and swear every time he hears Ishi say his name like that and just appear behind him, but Chihiro and Michi have both been getting on him about being more open with his emotions and it’s not like anyone else can actually see it. If Ishi’s telling the truth about his heritage, his powers, the role he’s played in Mondo’s life so far, then he’s already seen Mondo at his worst and watching him drop a wrench on his foot while tuning up his bike is far from the most embarrassing thing he’d have witnessed by now.

Not that Mondo _cares_. “Jesus Christ. Don’t sneak up on people like that, man.”

He stands up and turns, forgetting for a moment that the guy has no concept of personal space. Not that Mondo’s extends very far – he’s been known to get a little physically affectionate with people he knows well, but the effect here is just different. Ishi’s not touching him or doing anything an actual person would do, just kind of leaning into Mondo’s space, close enough to smell his breath. “Yer gonna give someone a heart attack one’a these days,” he says, refusing to back down.

For an angel with an untold amount of frightening power, he’s a good six inches shorter than Mondo. Mondo should be comforted by the distance; he’s used his height to his advantage countless times, establishing his dominance over things much deadlier than him. But that shit just doesn’t work on Ishi, who looks thoroughly unimpressed by almost everything Mondo does. “Nonsense. I appear in this form to _prevent_ humans reacting to me with fear.”

“Tell that to yer eyebrows n’ red eyes,” Mondo retorts.

It’s the first time he’s seen genuine surprise on that face, or any emotion that went deeper than general discomfort. He looks down at himself, his starched-white clothes and ridiculous tall boots, and then back up at Mondo. Like he doesn’t know quite what to say. He starts off with, “This is a vessel.”

“Yeah man,” Mondo says. “Kinda figured that, with all your ‘true form’ shit.”

Aaaand back to scowling. “It is not – _crap_,” he says, “Just because you can’t see it now.”

The way he says _now_ like there had been a _before_ still bothers Mondo. The feeling he’s forgetting something drives him crazy, like the kind of itches your arms aren’t long enough to reach, but in his mind. The fact that Ishi’s probably talking about Hell just makes it worse, because that’s about the last thing Mondo wants to try and remember.

He wants to say something, say anything that will take him someplace else, like maybe asking what his true form looks like or if there’s any way for Mondo to get back to being the special kind of person who can see and hear it without going blind and deaf, but Ishi’s still on a role. “- besides, this is just how this vessel _looks_. It would be rude of me to alter his appearance without his explicit permission.”

“Oh yeah?” Mondo turns to keep working on his bike, but it’s hard to focus when he knows he’s being stared at. He swallows, trying to keep his focus on the parts in front of him, holding down on the urge to look back. “Guess the eyes don’t count then, huh?”

He can practically hear Ishi blinking in confusion. “Come again?”

Well, if he’s not gonna be able to do what he came out here to do, he can make up for it by ribbing this guy a little. He stands, leaning against his ride, and gestures at Ishi with the wrench he’d dropped. “Red eyes ain’t exactly natural.”

“Neither are lavender.” Mondo’d had another comment to add on, about how red eyes were usually a signifier of demonic possession, but his cheeks are burning so hard his ears are ringing. Any time he thinks he’s taking a few steps forward in progress with this guy, he finds one of Mondo’s many sore spots and pushes.

He knows Ishi’s not teasing him, not challenging him like the guys in his gang vying for his power tried to. His bro always told him to bite his cheek and ignore it, not let them get under his skin and sure as shit not to show it if they did. He can’t even remember all the ways that they tried, but there’s layers of something built up underneath him now and he’s not about to let this guy push him around. “They’re grey,” he grinds out. “They're just light, ‘n look purple outside.”

He’s ready to fight if it comes to blows. Michi’s not around to hold him back and Daiya’s made it clear he’s not stepping in next time Mondo picks a stupid battle, so if Ishi wants to throw the first punch it’ll just be the two of them and supernatural or not, Mondo’s got a height and weight advantage on the guy.

Mondo tightens his hands into fists and remembers he’s got a wrench in his hand when he feels the metal like a sting against his skin. He almost shakes with it – there’s something in the back of his head telling him this feels so familiar, don’t go _there_, and he almost drops it again – but Ishi’s advancing toward him, expression unchanged. Not threatened in the least, doesn’t even seem to be picking up on Mondo’s anger, standing so close their chests are almost touching.

He almost chokes. Physically, and mentally, prepared to take a step back that leads nowhere. He doesn’t, even when Ishi lifts his hand.

It’s not a fist. In a way, it’s kind of worse; he just touches his fingers to the side of Mondo’s face and squints at him and Mondo has to tear into his lips to keep himself from screaming or making some other kind of embarrassing noise. He almost asks Ishi what he’s doing when his hand moves and he says, “No. They are definitely purple. But I was wrong about the hue; they are lilac.”

_Ridiculous. I’ve beat down **how** many goddamn monsters, and **this guy’s** got me fuckin’ trembling?_ Mondo licks his lips and tries not to stare at Ishi or look away or do much of anything when he hears a small cough and almost jumps.

But there’s nowhere for him to go. “Am I… interrupting something?”

“NO!” Mondo bellows, turning as much as he can toward where Chihiro is standing. He feels a compulsion to come up with an excuse as to why they were standing so close together, but Chi isn’t even looking at him. She’s staring at Ishi. Mondo looks between them for a moment, and gestures. “Uh. This’s Chi. Chihiro. Ya kinda, uh, knocked ‘er out the first time we met.”

Ishi turns his body stiffly, and bows even stranger. “My apologies. I needed to speak with Mondo alone.”

“That’s. Uhm. Okay?” She huffs, cheeks faintly pink, still looking between the two of them. “We have, uhm. We have a case, Mondo. About three hours from here. Michi thinks it might be a demon…” She trails off, looking back at Ishi, and Mondo can’t help it if he turns and looks at him as well. “I-ishi. Would you like to- uhm, d-did you want to come, too?”

“No.” Mondo thinks he hears rustling like wings as he vanishes.

* * *

Chihiro is weirdly enamored (he thinks that’s the right word) by the idea of Ishi, and talks about him for the entire ride. Well, sort of; she starts out by asking Mondo a ton of questions, like what does Ishi come to talk to him about? Has he explained why needed to pull Mondo out of Hell? Has Mondo seen what kind of powers he has? And, “Were you two having a moment?”

That lats one almost makes Mondo crash the car they hotwired to get over to the next town. He wouldn’t have this kinda issue on a bike, but he’s on Daiya’s idea of a probation until his brother stops being mad at him for bargaining his soul ‘like an idiot.’ At least Chihiro’s stored her anger away for the sake of the job. And it probably helps that she’s getting a big laugh out of his reaction.

“_No!_” he snaps, hands too tight around the steering wheel. “It ain’t like that. The guy just doesn’t get the concept of personal space.”

She lets it drop. In a way, he’s glad that it’s her and not Michi or Daiya who’s met Ishi, because Michi wouldn’t let him live it down and Daiya would probably try to kill Ishi and Mondo’s not altogether sure what it would take to do that or how he’d manage to bring his brother back from that one. But her letting it drop is only because she’s decided it’s time to bombard him with every piece of lore she’s found regarding angels. It’s not like there’s a lot, but most of what she’s got is Evangelical religious texts that are making his head hurt to try and listen to.

They don’t have anything to do with the case, either. Or at least, not the way he sees it. But then it’s only a couple of – admittedly, pretty strong – demons possessing some teenagers who thought a fun way to pass the time would be to break out the witchcraft. It’s nothing they can’t handle – hell he’s sure that he and Chihiro have handled worse on their own before, so four people working the same job? That’s gotta be overkill.

That’s what he _thinks_. But then, when was the last time Mondo was right about something?

The demon they’ve been fighting is way above their pay grade. Dispatching the first one, who must have been the younger of the two, was a cakewalk. The second one, though, is ancient, using the first as a decoy to keep draining the city of the… Well, whatever the hell it is demons need to survive. Or whatever that one needs, in particular. Souls? Maybe? It sounds right, but Mondo’s probably got a concussion and Michi’s out, draped over a knocked-down table.

Mondo almost stumbles as he stands. He knows where that other bitch is heading, even if Chihiro’s gotten better at hiding herself in situations like this. She’s still working on whatever the hell it is she’s doing, hijacking the house’s stereo system to play exorcism’s greatest hits or whatever. His head would be looping _Come on, Chi, hurry it up_, if he could feel something other than dizzy.

And Daiya, you know. He could hurry it up, too.

Well. Mondo’s only got one demon-killing knife on him. Daiya’s got the Colt. He could have searched Michi’s pockets, if he’d been able to form a coherent sentence between his ears, but that doesn’t matter much now. He has to keep her distracted, keep her from getting to Chihiro, because that’s who she’s here for. Who they’re _always_ here for.

“HEY!” The demon turns and looks at him, head turned uncomfortably sharp on her neck. Her hair – her vessel’s hair, he guesses he should say – is plastered and stuck to her face by blood. It all looks hot pink in the lighting, or maybe just because Mondo’s vision is all blurry. He doesn’t have a follow-up to his shout, but he doesn’t need one; the speakers kick on and ominous Latin blares all around him. God, he could just pass out.

“An exorcism?” The demon’s giggle is too high-pitched for him to let his legs give way. “That’s cute.” She looks up to the ceiling, and snaps her fingers. And the whole fucking room Chihiro was in comes crashing through, accompanied by her screaming.

A lot of things happen all at once. Maybe. Mondo’s not too clear on the flow of time, but he knows he launches his body somewhere in the direction of Chihiro and gets himself thrown up against a wall, almost choked. He hears Daiya’s voice or the timbre of it somewhere behind him, in the next room maybe. And then he sees the white cuff of a jacket, a watch, and a blade slitting the demon’s throat open.

Well, that sure as shit has never worked for him before. His head’s throbbing but he’s thinking it was probably another demon blade, and when her eyes have stopped doing that freaky thing they always do when a demon gets sent back to the pit it occurs to him to look up.

Damn. Ishi looks kind of frightening like this, posture still rigid and knife in one hand, blood on his shoes. He doesn’t exactly look thrilled to be here, and Mondo watches his mouth move and thinks as his chest deflates that Ishi must see what a fuck up Mondo is, that God or whoever’s got it wrong about Mondo being capable of whatever task he has in store for them, that keeping him alive just isn’t going to be worth it. That Mondo is now what he always has been: disappointing. And he’s going to pass out.

He doesn’t feel the hand on his cheek until everything else comes back. It’s like all those injuries reversing, and at the end of it there’s just nothing. No pain, or anything. The most he gets is out of breath.

There are tears, too goddamn many of them in Ishi’s eyes and his voice is too loud when he asks, “Can you hear me now? Are you okay?”

Except for the tears, Mondo’s reminded for a minute of those old cell phone commercials. He doesn’t get a moment to laugh about it or explain the joke when he hears a gun click behind him. “Back the fuck off my brother.”

Mondo should probably start thinking before he does stuff, like putting himself between an angel that has enough power to take out a high-powered demon and then heal a variety of serious injuries without breaking a sweat, and the gun being pointed at that angel by his brother. He says the words “Daiya, don’t,” a little too late.

“What is that?” Ishi asks, from behind his back. “A gun?”

“A gun designed to kill anything,” Mondo mutters.

“Oh.” His tone is flat. “That can’t hurt me.”

“Wanna try it?” Daiya baits. “Come out and we’ll test that theory.” He jerks his head almost into Michi’s indicating for Mondo to move.

“Daiya, no.” It kinda hurts to swallow, but he knows it’s not an injury this time. That shit’s all psychological. “This is Ishi.”

His brother frowns at him, but he does lower the gun a little. “An angel with red eyes? You gotta be shittin’ me.”

“I discussed this with Mondo earlier today. This is my vessel’s natural complexion, including his eyes –“

He hears a grumble and watches Michi, half draped over the back of Daiya’s body, puke on the floor. “C-chi?”

“Shit.” Mondo hisses and moves from between his brother and his… angel. He can tell she’s not under the rubble on the floor, but there’s a crack in the closet and a bit of a leg sticking out.

A really, badly mangled one. Mondo pushes the door the rest of the way open and Chihiro points her taser at them. If she pulls the trigger, it doesn’t go off, and she drops it when she realizes who it is. “I think my leg’s broken.” She looks embarrassed when she realizes Ishi is staring down at her. “Oh. Uh. H-hi, Ishi.”

Mondo drops down to try and get a good grab on her, already asking if she can stand when Ishi parrots his moves. It’s kind of funny to watch him mimic Mondo’s movements, but when she answers that she can’t and they get her foot out from under the plaster he puts a hand on her temple and she faints, for a second, and comes back.

She swings her leg back and forth, startled. “Uh. Thanks.” Ishi nods. Mondo’s too busy staring at him for a moment to remember to let Chihiro down. He can swear she’s giggling when he does, and Ishi follows seconds later. “We should get out of here before the cops show up, or anything.”

“I need to speak with Mondo for a moment,” Ishi says. His posture is back to inhumanly straight, hands at his sides. “Alone.”

“Yeah, no,” Daiya says. “You ain’t saying shit to him ‘til you answer our –“ he gestures by hiking Michi further up his shoulder – “Questions first.”

“No.” Daiya looks affronted, and Mondo hopes to God they’re not about to start some pissing contest in a destroyed suburban home, or really at all, anywhere. “I have no business with you. I need to speak with Mondo, alone.”

It’s the first time in a while Daiya’s been confronted with someone who didn’t just do as he said, and bewildered as he seems he’s not waving the gun around or anything. So they’re probably fine. But he does say, “Excuse me?”

“I don’t take orders from you,” Ishi says flatly. “If I can’t speak with Mondo now, then I will just have to find him later.” This time Mondo doesn’t react so strongly to the sound and the feeling of wings around him when he disappears.

Daiya blinks at space he’s just vacated, gaze drifting over to Mondo. He’s hoping there’s an apology, but they’ve both got faults passed down from their parents, and a hard time admitting defeat is one they both share. Daiya’s always been better at it, so when the words out of his mouth are, “Is he always like that?” Mondo knows the apology will come later.

(and it does, when Michi’s knocked out with sleep and Chihiro’s in the shower)

For now, Mondo just shrugs, and says “Yeah, kinda.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning for more emeto & blood in this chapter

It’s been over a week at this point since they last heard from Ishi and Mondo is getting… well, worried ain’t the word for it, exactly. He can handle himself, obviously. The image of him slashing that demon’s throat is tattooed to the insides of Mondo’s eyelids. He refuses to pinpoint which emotion he’s feeling predominantly. He’ll only acknowledge that somewhere in there is alarm, because the ease and practice of his movements mean to Mondo that he’s faced plenty of demons before, and he doesn’t know if it’s just existence as an angel or the occupation of being _Mondo’s_ angel is the reason he’s under attack.

Theoretically. Or in the past. Or something.

Dammit. He doesn’t need protecting, and Mondo wishes his brain would stop bringing the word up.

Chihiro smirks at him, finger saving her place in the newspaper so she can focus on Mondo while she goads him. “Just say you miss him, Mondo.”

“Shut up.” It doesn’t stop him from blushing, which he’s just doing because he’s embarrassed. He blushes lots of times. He should just stop thinking about it and go back to polishing the silver of his knife. “You find anything?”

To her credit, Chihiro only giggles instead of losing her absolute shit the way Michi or Daiya would have. Not that they’ve stopped giving him strange looks ever since they actually met the guy, or asking Mondo questions the same way Chi had. “Not much. There is one thing, but I’m not even sure if it’s…” Mondo looks up when she trails off. He’s seen her look scared a lot, concerned a lot, but never…this. Whatever it is. “Uh… Mondo? You might want to look at this.”

That strikes fear in him. He doesn’t do well with absorbing information from text, learns better when he hears or does something. He gets coordinates and instructions but rarely the primary source, so someone calling him over for his opinion is unnerving.

And he sees why she asks for it. He doesn’t need a second to think about it, just says, “We’re going.”

* * *

Ishi never told Mondo the full story of his vessel, just that he didn’t like Mondo calling what he was doing “possession” because unlike demons, angels have to ask first. And in the case of Ishi’s vessel, the guy had prayed for it.

It’s funny that Mondo calls him Ishi, because his vessel’s full name is Kiyotaka Ishimaru and if that’s a coincidence, it’s one hell of one. He had some kind of illness Mondo didn’t want to think about, something fatal, and managed to hold on long enough to say goodbye to his father before he mysteriously vanished. And now he’s reappeared, at home, completely cleared of whatever was plaguing his body before his disappearance.

Strange things do happen, it’s true. Can’t always assume that every weird thing you hear is the work of ghosts or God, but when the person making a miraculous recovery happens to be the bodysuit of your personal shoulder angel, that’s kind of a different story.

“I think we went to school with someone who lives around here,” Chihiro says. Mondo thinks she’s just making conversation because she looks pretty freaked out herself. They’ve never worked with something like this before and don’t really know what to expect. They’ve leafed through a couple of different fake identities before landing on a cover story most likely to get them in and talking to Ishi that won’t sound too suspicious when they start asking questions.

And it all blows out the window like a grocery list to a ledge when Ishi opens the door, face of absolute shock and says, “Oowada? Fujisaki?” Recognition, but not the same one. There’s something uncomfortable about it that makes Mondo’s stomach drop. “I… Wow.” Mondo watches his face go slowly red, trying to avoid looking at either of them. “Er, sorry. Excuse me. It _has_ been a while. Would you like to come in?”

* * *

So Mondo doesn’t remember _everything_ about his life. He still remembers every supernatural thing he’s ever hunted, every wound he’s received, the names of everyone in his and his brother’s gang, and what his parents looked like the last time he saw them at age twelve. But apparently, he doesn’t remember anything about high school. And neither does Chihiro.

He guesses that’s not quite accurate. Ish- _Taka_, talks. A lot. Almost like nervous rambling except he doesn’t stutter or trip over his words. He avoids looking at Mondo or Chihiro directly and Mondo feels panic taking over as he tries to figure out who else he knew in high school he’d have no memory of. He remembers Chihiro, potentially because they dropped out to get away from –

-no. He doesn’t remember what they were trying to get away from, even.

But Taka remembers everything, apparently, about high school.

Mondo’s just not sure how to ask.

“My apologies for rambling.” Even seated, his body is so stiff, permanently uncomfortable. “It’s just – it has been almost four years since I saw either of you. I don’t really know what to say.” He shifts, looking away for a moment. “I guess you’re here because you heard I got better?”

“Yeah,” Chihiro says, sounding dazed. She’s still a quicker thinker than Mondo, and asks, “How did that happen?” Her fingers twist in knots around each other. “I’m – I’m very glad it did –“ Taka’s face clouds into a scowl for a moment, and forces it back to neutral, but not fast enough for them to miss it. “I – I’m just. Curious.”

Taka stares at some point on the coffee table. “I don’t know,” he says flatly. “I don’t remember the past four or so months. I woke back up in a hospital lobby. Apparently I was missing? A nurse took me back and ran some tests on me, I got a flu shot, and they declared me cured.” A normal person would shrug, but Taka’s eyes only move some place else to indicate the thought has passed. “My father came and picked me up and…”

There’s a silence that none of them break, but then Taka looks up, actually looks them both in the eye in turn, and says, “Forgive me, I know this is rude and quite harsh, but you two are the last people I expected to come and see me. So why are you here, really?”

Neither one of them knows how to answer that.

* * *

Taka doesn’t exactly kick them out, but the hostility in the room is enough that they leave without being asked. They say they’ll come back later, that they can and should keep in touch, but it’s clear that Taka is skeptical and Mondo doesn’t blame him. They’re hunters; they don’t keep in touch. Even if Taka doesn’t know that part, it sounds like some things about Mondo never change.

Chihiro looks past the point of tears and she cries on the way back to the motel. He can tell it from the way her arms shake around his waist and she locks herself in the bathroom for forty-five minutes, reappearing with skin blotchy and a cold washcloth pressed against her eyes. “You don’t remember him either?” Mondo asks. She shakes her head, and goes to her computer.

And Mondo goes back to Taka’s house.

There’s some sort of weird mix of hurt and resignation in Taka’s face when he answers the door, and he forgets to give Mondo any kind of greeting. They just stand there, staring at each other.

He’s tense, just like Ishi. Mondo wonders if there’s any way that they’re both the same person, at once. “You want to say something, Oowada,” Taka says. He’s still not looking at him, arms folded and fingers gripping his sleeve tightly. “Just spit it out. You never were good with finding the right words.”

Mondo licks his lips and shoves his hands in his pockets to keep himself from picking at his skin. “’S gonna sound crazy.”

Taka sighs. “What else is new?” He almost laughs. Maybe if he could remember their interactions better, he would.

Mondo turns so he’s facing Taka completely. It shouldn’t matter if this pisses him off, because it’s not like he really knows the guy. But it still feels like facing a firing squad. He can even taste the gunpowder in his mouth. “I don’t remember high school.” Taka looks up at him from the corner of his eyes, disbelieving. “Like, any of it. Don’t even remember why I dropped out. Can’t remember the names’a anyone in our class, or their faces, ‘cept for Chi.” At least he’s moving, at least he’s actually facing Mondo now, and that should be a good thing so _why is he scared?_ “So I don’t remember what I fucked up or how I hurt ya and I don’t expect you to forgive me for whatever I did, but if you got any clue what happened or why I can’t remember anythin’…” He should be asking about Ishi. If he’s only got one shot at talking to Taka before the guy slams the door in his face, then he should be asking if he prayed for a way to recover. If he can remember speaking to any angels, even if he can’t remember the past three months.

But he doesn’t.

Taka looks down to the side, chewing his lips. It takes him a moment, but he finally responds. “I believe you.” Mondo watches the line of his throat as he swallows. “Maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe that’s stupid of me. But you only lied to me once – although I guess if you don’t remember anything…”

He looks like he’s about to start crying again. And Mondo really, really wants to move to comfort him.

_What the fuck’s going on with me?_

Taka sighs, before he starts talking, eyes on the ground. “I don’t know why you and Chihiro dropped out. I heard you weren’t the only ones. There was a girl in our class, Mukuro – she went missing. I was always surprised that her twin – that would be Junko – stayed behind. You used to say, if that was Daiya, you wouldn’t stick around. You’d be out looking for him.” Something like a smile flickers on his face. “It really ticked you off that Junko didn’t seem to care.” His tongue runs over his lips again, and he looks up at Mondo. “Do either of those names seem familiar to you?”

Mondo shakes his head. “Guess I can try an’ look for ‘em now.” _But… But… But…_ “What about us?”

He hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that. Taka laughs and tears actually slide down his cheeks this time. “I was hoping you wouldn’t ask about that.”

“I’m sorr-“

Taka puts a hand up, cutting him off. “Don’t. It’s just – very difficult for me, not to be angry with you. I know it isn’t your fault that you can’t remember. I… I honestly don’t believe you would forget me, willingly.” He looks back down at the floor and clears his throat. “I got sick at the start of our last year. I had to be hospitalized. None of the doctors could figure out what was wrong with me, and I wasn’t getting better. And, ah…” He closes his eyes. And for a minute, Mondo thinks Ishi’s about to come back. He opens up his mouth and looks like he changes his mind. “Well, you would come by the hospital almost every day. Makoto, too. He came by a lot.” Makoto? Like _that_ Makoto? “And then you just…stopped.”

Quiet, again. Mondo hates the silence, but he’s scared to break it. “I take it I didn’t tell ya why?” Taka shakes his head. “I know it prolly don’t mean much, since I can’t remember what happened, but I’m sorry.”

He half expects Taka to shrug. It’s how most people would react in discomfort, try to minimize their feelings. It is, at the very least, what Mondo would do. But Taka doesn’t, trying to re-establish eye contact so he can drop the words “You and I were together” on Mondo’s lap like a bowling ball.

Mondo doesn’t need a clarification of what he means by ‘together.’ He gets it, all at once, and all those uncomfortably close and tight feelings he’s been getting make sense.

There are so many things he’d like to say based on emotions he’s just starting to feel, ones that were probably there before and erased alongside his memory, but saying them now would feel disingenuous. He can’t keep in touch. If he wants Taka to be happy, to be safe – which he wants for everyone, must have wanted for him specifically at some point in time – then he absolutely can’t do that. Can’t rekindle whatever they had or even think about it.

He doesn’t often sit around and mourn the things that could have been if his life was different, and he doesn’t get the chance to do it now, either. He’s got one leg over the fence to just _tell_ Taka what it is he’s been doing, that even if he can’t remember him or _them_ that he wouldn’t have just left him with no good reason.

But then he feels it. Something like a slight tremor or a chill going by and he watches Taka collapse like it’s happening in slow-motion.

Mondo knows the drill, could do it in his sleep. He doesn’t pay much mind to Taka’s distorted muttering_ It’s happening again, they’re coming again_; he picks Taka up and drops him on the couch in the next room, and starts tearing the kitchen apart for salt.

“Mondo?” Taka doesn’t stay in the living room. He’s supporting himself on the wall, and Mondo isn’t all that surprised to see he doesn’t stay put. There’s no way he’d date someone who just follows without question, doesn’t challenge his methods. “What’s –“ he presses a hand over his mouth. He looks like he might vomit. _So he smells the sulfur too_. “What are you looking for?”

“Salt.” He can’t keep staring, has to keep looking.

“Bottom right.” Mondo hears a chair moving out from the table as he grabs it. “Is this – N- n –“

Mondo almost spills half the bag as he turns around. _Line the windows, line the doors. Line the windows, line the doors. Li-_ “Is it what?” It’s so hard to pour in a straight line when his hands are all shaky. “Come on, man. Talk to me.”

“No, it’s – you wouldn’t remember.” He looks like he’s about to pass out. Or vomit. Or both.

Mondo runs into the next room, brain playing on loop that he hopes to god they’ve got enough salt for this. He shouts over his shoulder, “Tell me anyway.”

“Y-you said – day before you left f-for good… You were going to find out wh-what was causing this.”

Mondo stops for a moment, unable to process the thought.

_Keep moving_. “This what happened before? When ya got sick?” He hears retching noises and his brain decides ‘to hell with this' and drops the bag, running back to the kitchen.

There’s blood pooled on the table. It’s running down Taka’s nose, past his lips…or even from his mouth, Mondo can’t tell. The panic’s making it hard for him to see anything but red. “Class,” he says, his body shaking. “W-wish – wish I was like – like you. Couldn’t remember.” He looks like he’s trying to laugh.

Mondo shrugs his jacket off and wraps it around Taka’s shoulder. “Hey, man. I ain’t exactly happy, forgettin’ you.” He pulls the knife from his pocket, and paces as the house continues to shake. Thinks to himself that they gotta get Taka to a hospital, but how the hell are they gonna do that when they got whatever the fuck this is attacking?

He hears glass shatter in the other room. So he guesses he fucked up somewhere.

He can’t be certain it’s the only place where he’s messed up his line of salt, and he’s cursing himself on the inside for not having the foresight to lay down a couple devil’s traps. He got caught up in emotions, like he always does, and now it’s a bit too late to make one the size he’d need it to be or put it somewhere the devil won’t find it. He tries to maneuver Taka into a corner and shield him with his body since it’s too late now, from the sounds of the heels, to hide him somewhere else.

He feels like he’s seen this girl somewhere before, too. The demon, or the person whose body they’re inhabiting. Her black hair is cut into chops, the longest parts reaching down to her ass. She’s got this kind of crazed look in her eyes, and it doesn’t take much for her to snap Mondo’s wrist and send the knife spiraling. “Don’t worry,” she says, giggling and shrugging off her coat. It’s kind of sick that there’s a nurse’s uniform underneath. “I’m just here to do a little check-up on my patient.”

Mondo raises his fists, swallowing down the bile in his throat. He doesn’t care how bad it all hurts, he can’t keep being the reason people get hurt. “Like hell ya are.”

She tilts her head at him, faking sympathy. “What exactly are you gonna do, huh? Take care of him yourself?” She smirks. “I think that’s a little out of your jurisdiction. But if you want to play this game, I don’t mind giving out free samples.”

He doesn’t want to know what she means by that. And luckily, he doesn’t have to find out. Somewhere along the line someone else managed to get in and creep up behind her. There’s about a two second frame of a sword piercing through her stomach and her body dropping to the ground, revealing yet another terrifying red-eyed supernatural whatever behind her.

Mondo starts to reach for the knife, but the girl (or whatever) with the sword cuts him off. “Don’t bother. It wasn’t you I came here to kill.” He looks up at her, silver hair in braids and arms crossed over her chest, giving him the same kind of judgmental look Ishi normally does.

“Let me guess. Angel?”

“Correct.” Mondo nods. He looks behind him, mouth open to explain to Taka what he is and what he does, only to see Taka passed out on the floor.

He drops down to his knees and pulls Taka up to his lap, shaking him slightly. “You wanna help me out here?” he asks.

“No.” He’s got his fingers by Taka’s pulse and can feel that it’s there, kind of faint, but he’s caught off-guard by her harsh answer. “He’s none of my concern.”

“Are you fuckin’ serious?” Mondo snaps. “He got injected by some whacked-out nurse demon. Ain’t that _your_ jurisdiction?” She tilts her head at him, but it’s not nearly as endearing as when Ishi does it. “And this guy – aren’t all you guys brothers or somethin’?”

She blinks. “The angel that has, in the past, possessed his body is my brother, yes. But he can find another body.”

“You –“

She cuts him off. He’s getting kind of tired of that. “He can always find another vessel. That isn’t the problem.”

“Then what the hell is?!”

“You.” Mondo feels like he just swallowed glass. “You distract him, Mondo Oowada, from the mission.” _Is that why he’s_ – “That’s why I am here, not him. He has been…grounded, temporarily. Receiving a lecture. Because he likes you too much.”

He’s not sure how to respond to that, even how to feel about it. He feels something tugging at the front of his shirt and he looks down at Taka, blood still dripping from his nose. “S-so you were…about your brother. D-demons?”

Mondo tries swallowing around the shards in his throat. “Guess I told ya about that sometime.” He wants to run a hand over his hair, but he can’t like this. “Yeah. Daiya and I hunt demons.” He watches Taka’s eyes try and move over to the other angel, but she’s gone now.

He feels fingers again, this time closer to his neck, tracing a cord and pulling it from under his shirt.

Taka looks more awake now, surprised and paler. “You kept- kept it.” Mondo nods, although he’s not sure what it is he’s agreeing that he kept for a moment. “M-my button. The sec…” His eyes flutter shut, totally out now.

* * *

Getting Taka to the hospital is a hell of a thing. He could have called an ambulance, he knows, but then they’d see the dead body on the floor and he’s not sure he’s in a good enough state mentally to come up with a good reason for it being there. So he calls Chi to let her know where he is, straps Taka into the passenger’s seat, and speeds off. At a loss of what else to call him, he tells the nurses he’s Taka’s domestic partner, and tries not to let his overwhelming guilt drown him.

_His button. His second button._

Mondo hadn’t really asked himself why he was wearing the necklace, just knew that taking it off felt bad. Felt wrong. And now he knows why, and feels even more like he _should_, ‘cause he sure as hell doesn’t deserve to wear it.

He tries praying while he’s waiting. He doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing, and since his memory is shot he doesn’t even know Ishi’s full name and he doesn’t know if the thought alone is enough. He doesn’t know any real prayers, so all he can do is beg for Ishi or someone to come and help him out. Not Mondo him, but Taka him. Whatever happens to Mondo, happens. And it stopped mattering what that was a while ago.

He’s almost asleep on the uncomfortable plastic hospital chair when a smack on his shoulder wakes him up. He’ll pretend his heart doesn’t sink a little when he sees it’s his brother, not Ishi in whatever form he’d take. “Domestic partner, huh? You got somethin’ you wanna tell me, lil bro?” He’s smirking, but it falls apart easily when he sees the look on Mondo’s face, and he sighs. “Sorry. Chi did tell me, uh, a little. You and this guy were friends in high school?”

Mondo shakes his head, licking his lips and looking away. “It’s not…” He leans with his elbows on his knees and starts tugging at his hair, pulling it down. “Whatever. Another guy I let down. So what the fuck else is new?”

He can feel Daiya rubbing his back like he used to when they were kids and he’d be throwing up from malnutrition and expired canned goods. “Hey now, man, come on. Who do you think you’ve let down?”

“You!” He doesn’t mean to shout it, but it all comes out at once. “Chihiro! Michi! Ishi, Taka, Makoto, everyone else from school I’ve apparently just forgotten. All’a heaven and hell and anyone else I’ve ever met. All I do is fuck up.” He gestures with one hand to the open hospital room door and loses his words, pulling at the cord around his neck, showing it to Daiya. “You know what this is?”

“Second button?” His eyes flicker to the door and back to Mondo. In a much quieter voice, he says, “Oh.”

“And I can’t even fuckin’ remember him. Guess I said I was gonna find a cure for this shit he came down with, and I couldn’t even do that right. Couldn’t do that, couldn’t be there for him, and now he’s gonna die and it’s **_MY GODDAMN FAULT!_**” A nurse turns in her station and hushes him, tells him if he can’t calm down that he’s going to have to leave. Daiya makes some murmured assurances and probably makes some flirtatious eyes while Mondo rubs at his eyes with the wrist he’s starting to remember, adrenaline winding down, is broken.

If it doesn’t heal correctly, that’s just what he deserves.

Daiya’s quiet for a couple moments, before he pushes up on Mondo’s shoulder, forcing him to sit upright. “Look at me.” His voice is commanding, but soft. When Mondo looks up, he’s smiling sadly. Mondo wonders when the last time he cried was. “I can’t speak for your school friends or yer guardian angel, but I can tell ya this: Michi don’t blame you. Neither does Chi. And I can honestly say, you have never disappointed me.” He huffs out a laugh. “You scare the shit outta me, man, but you don’t disappoint me. And I’m sorry, if I ever made ya feel like you did.”

Mondo wants to say _thank you_, but his lips are too dry and his throat hurts too much.

He sees bare feet standing in the doorway.

Daiya is up before he is, shoving his hands in his pocket. “How ya doin’, kiddo? I’m –“

Taka blinks at him. “I remember you.”

The change of voice isn’t great, but it’s enough for Mondo to notice it. He feels…sad, or something. There’s just been too much to process, and his wrist is killing him. “Ishi.” He nods. “So does that mean Taka’s…” He doesn’t want to say it.

Ishi shakes his head, walks up too close to Mondo once again. “He called for me. No, he is not dead. The pain was too much for him to handle, so he’s…resting.” He looks from Mondo’s face to his hand, and picks it up between two of his.

Mondo’s not sure how to feel about them doing this in front of his brother. It feels weirdly intimate. And just weird, in general. “I called for you too,” he blurts out. “I mean. Think I did. Mighta done it wrong.”

“No, you did it correctly,” he says as the pain fades away. “I heard you, but I could not come. I was being reprimanded, and could not leave.” His fingers are soft enough to tickle on the inside of Mondo’s freshly healed wrist. “Since Kiyotaka’s prayer was for you, I was able to ‘kill two birds with one stone,’ as the saying goes.”

He looks up at Mondo and beams. Seeing it is… Odd. He can’t sort through the emotions he feels right now, or the echoes of emotions he’s sure he felt before. He can almost see this as Taka smiling, can almost feel it there.

But he can’t really go back to that, can he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in supernatural, dean has this amulet he wears all the time that sam (his brother) gave to him for christmas, and i wanted mondo to have something kind of similarly meaningful. so, you know. second button on a string.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a bit of a warning for talk of suicide but there's nothing graphic in here about it  
also boy i keep accidentally making each chapter longer than the last... whoops!  
we'll have to see about day 5. i started my new job yesterday, so!

Mondo doesn’t know how to feel about this latest sequence of events. It’s not even the latest, anymore, actually. Several days have passed since Taka was re-introduced into his life, dropped back into the hospital and then re-inhabited by Ishi, and it’s still the only thing Mondo can think about. It’s made him sloppy, but the only one getting riled up about it is Michi. And that’s probably because Michi’s the only one who doesn’t know.

He runs out to get food and tells them all in half-hearted snaps that he really doesn’t need the company, or the backup. He’ll be back with everyone’s orders in no time, and if they wanna help him bring in the drinks and shit when he gets back that’s fine but he could really use the time to himself. He’s got a lot to think about.

When he gets back to the motel no one’s out to help him bring shit in, but Chi’s propped the door partway open so he can shove it fully open with his foot. It’s a trick they’d gotten into, for whenever they were on their own and Mondo had to run out and get shit while Chihiro got absorbed in her research. It’s not exactly safe, and one of these days he’s sure Daiya will give them an earful about it, but he can see Chihiro’s arms moving in her little green sweater so he knows it’s not some kind of trap.

Chihiro jumps when Mondo knocks the door open and he’s got an apology half out on his tongue that dies when he sees Taka standing in his blind spot.

_Ishi_. When he sees _Ishi_ standing in his blind spot.

He’s staring at Mondo, and it makes Mondo think back with envy on the days when he couldn’t differentiate Ishi’s expressions and thought they were all just various shades of mad. He knows better now, and that makes it harder for him to stay detached when Ishi’s looking at him with such hurt. Mondo puts the drinks down and tries not to look too much at him, in case his mind decides it’s time for him to wonder how close Ishi’s expressions are to Taka’s.

Chihiro looks between the two of them, left hand covering her right in nerves. It’s weird how she can watch Mondo take down demons in all manner of violent methods he can think of, but social interaction is what gets her anxiety going. “Uhm,” she starts, lips humming on the filler. “I-ishi, didn’t you have something you – you w-wanted to say to Mondo?”

Mondo doesn’t know if angels need to swallow, or even blink and breathe, but he watches Ishi do it anyway and wonders if he just picked it up like a nervous habit.

_Because he likes you too much._

“I can save it for later!” he announces, voice far too loud for the space. Chihiro reaches a hand out to him, but he’s already disappeared.

Her hand drops to her side, slowly, crestfallen. She turns to Mondo, perplexed and trying so hard not to show her disappointment, although he doesn’t know if it’s directed at him or at Ishi. “You wanna help me get the food outta the car?” he asks. Chihiro sighs and shuts the cover of her laptop down. “Guess that’s a no, he mumbles.”

“He thinks you’re mad at him, Mondo.” She crosses her arms over her chest and almost manages to look intimidating. “You’ve been avoiding him, and he doesn’t understand what he did wrong. And frankly, I’m not sure I do either.”

Mondo lets air huff out of his mouth and shakes his head, twirling the keys around his finger as he swings the door back open. “Nothin’, Chi. He didn’t do nothin’.”

He’s not expecting her to follow out but she does, trailing behind him and grabbing most of the bags of food herself. “You know I don’t believe that, Mondo.” He follows her up the stairs, but she’s left her keys inside so it’s him trying to wrestle open the door when she asks, “Does this have something to do with what Taka told you?”

He drops the key and the food and almost his drink, barely managing to hold onto it and still squeezing the cup so hard the lid pops off and soda sloshes all down his hand.

His reaction or the speed of it must have scared her, and that’s hard to do these days; she takes a step back and covers it quickly by crouching to grab the dropped food, sliding the key closer to where he’s bent over. He doesn’t know how to ask whatever the hell it is he really wants to ask, but she’s got him covered. “Daiya didn’t tell me anything,” she offers. “He just said to give you some space to process things.” He nods, and hums, finally managing to get the door open. He kicks on the door adjoining the two rooms to let his brother and Michi know they’re back.

Chihiro grabs his arm. And she’s got a lot more strength now than…

_In high school?_

“Hey.” She gives him something soft, almost like a smile. “I know you went back to talk to him about what we can’t remember. And I don’t want you to tell me anything you’re not ready for. But when you are ready…” She smiles wider, and tries to make it bright, but it’s like looking at sunlight through broken glass. “I’m here.”

* * *

Mondo wakes up with the kind of migraine he’s learned to associate with hangovers and head colds. The heat, though… The heat, he doesn’t have an explanation for. For whatever his memories are worth he can’t think of a single time he’s stayed in a motel that had a properly working heater. He’s always either freezing or burning up, no in-betweens.

_So maybe I’m in a hospital._

He panics, and jolts. The thought of hospitals makes him nervous, sets his heart to racing in his throat until he feels like he might throw it up. But if this _was_ a hospital, he can be certain of two things: For one, it wouldn’t be this dark. And two, he wouldn’t have another body next to his, rolling over and wrapping an arm around his waist.

Mondo Oowada does not share a bed, ever. Even when he and Daiya got kicked out of the house and all they could afford was a one-room apartment with a tiny living area, he slept on the hard ass floor until they could scrounge up the cash for an extra futon. He’s got too many nightmares and hang-ups to sleep next to another person, so feeling someone else’s hair against his skin as they start to cuddle into him is –

“Mondo? What are you doing up?” His heart stops somewhere in his throat. _That voice_. It’s groggy, in a way he’s never heard or can’t remember having ever done so, but he recognizes it all the same. And the arm around his waist squeezes as his bedmate pushes himself up, leaning against him, eyes squinting in the dark of the room.

“Ishi?” He doesn’t mean to whisper, but the word comes out hushed all the same.

He huffs softly, amused, and presses his forehead against Mondo’s side. “You haven’t called me that since our first year of high school.” His fingers tickle on Mondo’s back, and he presses his lips against Mondo’s stomach. “Whatever it was, it was just a dream. Go back to sleep.”

Just a dream. Right. Yeah. Mondo’s had lucid dreams before, and even a few with fuzzy memories he can’t quite remember in the morning. So this, no matter how real it feels, must be a dream. A dream. A dream. A dream. A dream. A dream. A

When he wakes up, it’s the same bed. He doesn’t need to open his eyes to know it’s the same; it’s more comfortable than any other bed he’s ever slept in. He’s not as warm as he had been, but maybe that’s the lack of a second body holding onto his. Or maybe it’s the fact that he’s naked. (He can’t remember if he was before.)

This is an apartment. Someone else’s apartment, because he can still remember what the shitty flat he and his brother used to live in looked like and it was never anything like this. His clothes are folded neatly on a chair by a desk, which can only mean one thing: he is still fucking dreaming. There’s no other explanation.

He pulls on the clothes he guesses he was wearing the previous night in this dream world and tries not to think too hard about how real everything in his dream feels before walking out of the room to explore what the hell kind of environment this is. It’s…oddly neat, not the kind of place he normally has dreams about – not that he dreams of domesticity all that often. And Ishi’s still here, at the counter chopping vegetables or making food or something.

Mondo doesn’t really know what to do with himself. In his normal lucid dreams, the control he has over his body and his actions is minimal. He can change certain aspects, tell himself to wake up before things lead to disaster, but his body overall is numb, hollow. Whatever choices he could potentially make change very little about the outcome. And here…

“Mondo?” He jumps a little when he feels fingers soft against his chin. Soft, but _there_. Ishi is standing in front of him, countenance more relaxed than he’s ever seen it. He’s dressed in a suit, those knee-high boots replaced with some kind of smaller, fancier shoes, and he’s wearing a ridiculous apron over his clothes while he cooks. “Are you okay? You look…troubled.”

Mondo licks his lips and tries to think of something normal to say <strike>because if this were a dream he wouldn’t have to think he wouldn’t have to put in the effort it would just happen</strike> , but nothing comes to mind.

Ishi tilts his head at him, a movement that should be familiar but the feeling behind it is all wrong. His focus moves from Mondo’s eyes to his lips, eyebrows furrowed. “Is it that dream, again?”

“Dream?” His voice is a little too loud with how close they’re standing, but Ishi doesn’t flinch.

“Yes,” he says. “The nightmare you get sometimes – the one about me in the hospital?”

Mondo’s throat is tight when he swallows, and it hurts. Something about all this hurts, uncontrollably, and it’s a miracle he doesn’t start crying. His hand goes back to his hair and tangles in the loose strands, trying not to look at Ishi or whatever it is using his image. “Gonna have ta kinda help me out here,” he says. “Feelin’ kinda dazed, yanno?”

Ishi shakes his head firmly. “No. We are not going over that – I am not going to upset you further!” His fingers move to pull Mondo’s face closer, and kiss him softly.

**(THIS ISN’T A DREAM.  
(DREAMS DON’T FEEL LIKE THAT.**

“Just sit down, and try to relax,” Ishi says, moving back to the counter. “Just remember that we’re safe, here. I’m safe.” He says that, but Mondo doesn’t think he’s so sure.

* * *

This has got to be some sort of monster attack. Mondo just isn’t sure which _one_. Once he sees Ishi out the door on his way to work, he starts rummaging through every drawer he can find in the hopes of finding any kind of notes he might have written, but there’s absolutely _nothing_ related to hunting anywhere in the apartment. All he finds is two boxes – one small and velvet that he wants to keep hidden no matter how fake this dream world is, and a wooden box like the one in the trunk of the car because even in his dreams Daiya’s trying to embarrass him with his baby pictures.

If he has a cell phone in this world, he can’t find it; but the apartment still has a landline for whatever goddamn reason, so he’ll be using that. He tries about eight different burner phone numbers he remembers for Daiya, and not a single one of them – or any of his fake names – rings a bell to the strangers Mondo accidentally manages to catch instead.

So his next best bet is Takemichi. And that takes him a couple tries, too, to get the phone number right, so used to just punching the name in on his phone.

At least this time, his voice is unmistakable, rough and quick. “Yo.”

Mondo sighs, relieved. “Yo, Michi, it’s me.”

“’Me’ who?”

Mondo scowls at the space of wall he’s facing. “Mondo.”

“Mondo…?”

“Oowada!” _What the fuck?_ There’s a silence on the other end he doesn’t he doesn’t much care for, and for an agonizing minute he thinks that whatever monster that’s managed to wipe Ishi’s memory has just transported in to another universe entirely.

But then Michi’s voice comes back, angrier. “What the fuck do you want, Oowada?”

“Jesus.” He doesn’t mean to say it into the receiver, but he’s a little taken aback. No, a lot taken aback. But whatever’s bothering him can probably wait until he’s figured out whatever the hell is going here, if it’s not a direct side effect of the same thing. “I’m lookin’ for Daiya.”

There’s another moment of silence in which he hears Michi breathing, and he starts to say his name before the other man speaks up. “You ain’t talked to me in five fucking years, and the first thing you say to me is ‘Where can I find my dead brother?’”

**_MY WHAT?_** “Michi –“

“Don’t fuckin’ ‘Michi’ me!” he shouts. “You used us like leverage to get into that fancy-ass school of yours and didn’t say shit the second you graduated. We didn’t mean _jack_ to you once you made yer new friends, so fuck you, Mondo Oowada. Go ta hell.”

There’s no dramatic clang of a receiver being slammed down, but Mondo’s head makes the sound effect for him. So alternate universe, indeed – one where his brother’s dead and Michi hates him, but for whatever reason Ishi is still here, with Mondo. So, a being with reality-warping powers strong enough to erase not only his memory, but the memory of an angel?

…that sounds impossible.

Unless it really is a dream.

He’s got one last call to make. And Chihiro’s phone number he knows by heart, hammered it into his head in case they ever got separated, something happened to his phone, god knows whatever possibilities there could be. It’s his responsibility to take care of her, no matter what, and no matter how much he’s fucked up everything else in his life, he won’t make that mistake.

At least Chihiro doesn’t need to be told who it is calling her. “Hey, Mondo! What’s up?”

“Chi. I need your help.” His anxiety gets the better of him again, rushing out the words before he can get out any niceties.

But Chihiro doesn’t seem to mind. She giggles. “I thought you might.” _A little weird. Could she be…?_ “Wanna narrow it down for me?”

“I don’t have any of my notes with me. Ta be honest, not even sure where the hell I am. You got any idea on…” What’s the word, what’s the word… “How to kill a – a djinn?”

He can hear the confusion in her pause. “Uhh…” Which just sort of confirms his suspicions. “Mondo?” _Dammit_. “I don’t think your attempts at scripting your proposal are going very well. Maybe you should just tell him you want to marry him?”

Eight different things in his chest hurt. “Yeah,” he says, flatly, dejected. There are a couple ways out of this scenario, none of them good. “We got any ruins in this town?” he tries.

“You had that dream again, didn’t you?” Mondo blinks, tugging at his bottom lip with his teeth. _Is that some kind of clue?_ “Mondo, it’s okay to admit that you’re scared he’ll get hurt again – but it was just pneumonia –“

“Pneumonia?”

“Uh…yeah?” The confusion hasn’t cleared up at all. “Senior year, when Taka got sick –“ _So this is Taka, and that explains a lot_ – “But he’s fine, Mondo. I know it was serious – I- I’m not trying to downplay that! But he’s been healthier since then.” _So in this world this fake world his sickness the thing that almost killed him the thing the demon gave him that almost killed him was just pneumonia fucking pneumonia –_ “Things are going to be okay. It’s alright to let yourself be happy.”

Mondo grinds his teeth together. He knows that’s just a bait from the djinn, just a plea to keep him from doing what he’s already decided he needs to do, but that doesn’t stop him from thinking _You’re wrong_.

* * *

Mondo’s not the best at research. That’s more Chihiro’s forte, and Daiya’s. He and Michi are more of the hit-first-ask-questions-later type of guys. Maybe, somewhere in the back of his head, inaccessible, are tips about research that he’d picked up from high school. Maybe from Taka. But he doesn’t have much to go off of now, and researching how to do this is a little…uncomfortable. It’s something he hasn’t thought about for a long time.

He’s gotten caught up in the small bits of lore he’s managed to track down, trying to figure out a plan about how he’s gonna both wake up and kill the djinn once he’s managed to do that first part, and he forgets that he’s living with <strike>Ish</strike> _Taka_ in this fantasy world, and that eventually he’s going to come home from wherever it is he goes to work.

It startles him when Taka walks in, and then laughs softly at his little jump. He touches the back of Mondo’s neck, rubbing his back as he goes to kiss his temple. He doesn’t even seem bothered by the way Mondo slams the laptop shut before he can see it, because dream world or not he (doesn’t want taka to suffer

Taka moves back into his (their) [fake] bedroom, and calls out, “Anything in particular you want to do for dinner?

Mondo lifts the top back open, and closes out of his tabs. “Anything you want.” He swallows. “Taka.”

He closes the laptop over again and stands, heading for the door, but Taka’s voice stops him. “Where are you going?”

When Mondo turns back to make up some shitty excuse, something about needing to smoke although to his recollection he hasn’t done that in almost three years. But Taka’s standing there in an old tee-shirt of his, one that Mondo has shoved in his suitcase but rarely wears because the fabric feels too nice for the kind of violence he’ll be committing while wearing it. And he knows its his own, not some holdover from a life in high school he can’t remember, because it’s way too big on Taka, who’s just looking at him worriedly from the doorway.

It’s just an illusion. Just a trick. And it’s almost working.

Mondo swallows hard around the anxiety in his throat, walks up to Taka and starts pressing kisses all over his face until he’s laughing softly and trying to push Mondo back. “You’re being strange today. Was it time to re-read the letters?”

Mondo presses his lips to Taka’s forehead and tries to steady his breathing. “Which letters?” he mumbles.

“You _know_ which ones,” he says, swatting Mondo’s chest. “Honestly, Mondo. You made a _box_ for them. You can pretend all you want that you don’t still read them every month, but sometimes I catch you.”

(A box?)

(_That_ box?)

“Really, Mondo…” Taka pushes him back again, this time with more force, enough that he takes a half-step back. “Are you okay?”

Mondo nods, knowing he doesn’t look convincing and not caring a damn bit about that. He moves his hands from Taka’s neck to his cheeks so he can tilt his face up and kiss him properly. _Five seconds._ Because it doesn’t matter what the circumstances are. _Ten seconds_. This life, his real life, any variation of other universes – _twelve seconds_ – chances are good he will die before he ever gets to do this again.

_Sixteen seconds._ “I’m just gonna go get some fresh air. That dream really, uh… shook me up.” He shoves his hands in his pockets. “I’ll be back, babe. Promise.”

* * *

Needless to say, he does not go back. He goes up to the roof because he doesn’t know where to find a gun and pills might take too long and a knife is too risky. If Taka catches him – even fake Taka – he doesn’t think he’ll be able to handle that.

Not that it stops Taka from finding him anyway.

He doesn’t hear himself being followed, but he’s nearly at the ledge and Taka’s asking him, “Why are you doing this?”

Fake Taka doesn’t appreciate it much when Mondo says, “Because this isn’t real.”

He tells Mondo, “It could be.”

And there’s just a shitton of reasons Mondo could point to and counter his words about why staying here and letting himself be eaten alive is a bad idea, but the first one that comes out of his mouth is “No, it can’t. You’re not him.”

He wakes up after that. He hasn’t even jumped or anything yet, but consciousness jumps from the sunsetting on the roof of an apartment complex to the dingy and molded surroundings of ruins he can’t identify in the dark, and he nearly stumbles. The djinn’s body is on the floor by his feet, his blood growing sticky on the stone. Mondo’s arms hurt – he was probably bound up and hanging, and he feels the echo of Taka’s fingertips on his jaw.

_Ishi’s_.

He’s not looking at him at first, but checking the pulse on another body Mondo can only guess was meant to be the appetizer to Mondo’s main course. Ishi sets her body down on the floor and looks back up at Mondo, and he chokes. There’s just tears in Ishi’s eyes, some of them running down his cheeks, like he’s not even aware that he’s doing it.

Mondo could have sworn he’d been told – by research, by one of Ishi’s less-friendly superiors – that angels didn’t have emotions. They weren’t programmed to. They were created to be God’s perfect soldiers, just and immovable. It wouldn’t work, _they_ wouldn’t work, if they had free will or feelings. Yet his eyes, his expression, the way he carries himself and moves, looks at Mondo and every time he’s touched him…

He stands, and moves the knife he’s been holding so he’s grasping the blade and takes Mondo’s hand, thumb pressing it open. He puts the handle on Mondo’s palm, and closes the fist back over.

Normal distance. He’s standing at a normal distance, respect for personal space, like he’s trying to make himself pull back. His fingers still linger on Mondo’s like they’re pulled together like magnets and prying them apart would be a trial on its own. Mondo swallows and tastes the blood from his tongue as it slides down the back of his throat, acid churning in his stomach. “What is this?” he asks. Just standard procedure.

He isn’t looking at Mondo when he responds. “A blade that can kill anything. Even angels.”

“Why –“ _Is it because I’ve been distant? Is it because I met Taka? Is it because you’ve been reprimanded? Is it because you can’t feel anything? Is because you’re feeling **something**?_ “- are you giving this to me?”

His nose is running. It’s a little gross, and there’s some weird sense in the pit of Mondo’s stomach that recognizes it and hurts. But he does look up at Mondo, once Mondo’s seen him run through the thoughts in his head. He presses his tongue to his top lip, slowly, and Mondo wonders again if it’s a natural reflex or a tick he’s picked up from watching others. “Because you worry me, Mondo.”

Ishi starts to pull his hand away, and Mondo knows when he does he’ll be gone before he can ask anything else. His hand moves a little too fast and makes a hell of a noise when it claps against Ishi’s cheek, but he’s got to make sure he has his attention. “Wait.” Ishi’s tongue has disappeared back into his mouth, but Mondo… Mondo needs to… “I gotta ask you something.”

He looks startled. “Alright.” Something in his voice sounds strangled. He thinks he hears him whisper the word, _anything_. “What is it?”

“Did you –“ This is the hardest part, but it’s what’s been eating him. Why he’s pushed and avoided and hid and been hurting the both of them. “Did you know?” _I don’t want to know._ “Who yer vessel was.” _I don’t want to know if he did._ “To me. Did you know what Taka was to me when you took him?” _I can’t forgive him if he did._

But I can’t shut him out either. “No.” He still sounds choked. “He told me.”

“He can-“ He’s heard it like a term, all the time. Like a metaphor. That you’ll let your walls come down with the right people. It always sounded like sentimental junk, not the kind of shit he believed, but he thinks he’s crying for the first time in he doesn’t know how long. “You can talk to him? When yer in his body?”

Ishi shakes his head. Shakes Taka’s head. “He can see my true form.” His eyes follow when Mondo bites his lip. “When he prayed for me to come back, he told me what you… were. And that he wanted me to help you.” And Mondo watches him swallow.

“Did _they_ know? Yer – yer supriors, whoever that fuckin’ scary lady with the sword was?” _Because what would be a better way to manipulate me than using… _

His mind trails off. Ishi’s opened his mouth, but Mondo watches something flicker behind his eyes that looks so much like recognition followed by fury. There’s something almost wild in it, like when he watched Ishi slit that demon’s throat who’d tried to kill him. It makes his heart thump harder in his chest, making a noise like someone pounding on a door to be let in from the cold. “I don’t know,” he says. His voice is sharp, and he doesn’t need Mondo’s prompting to continue. “It… It would not surprise me if they did.” He takes a moment, nostrils flaring, eyes blinking. “I was given a list of acceptable vessels, and told to pick one. I was informed that some of them may have been your former classmates, and that picking their guise might lead you to trust me.”

Mondo tries so hard not to dig his nails into the back of Ishi’s neck, even if he knows there’s no way he could feel it. A touch like that to someone of his magnitude wouldn’t even feel like mosquito bites. It’s less the pain than the gesture; he’s spent too long trying to push him away, and this isn’t his fault. It wasn’t his doing.

Maybe trusting him is stupid. “And you picked him, ‘cause he could see you?”

But he hasn’t lied to Mondo yet. “No.” He shakes his head. “I answered the first prayer I heard.” Mondo blinks. “He wanted to see his father one last time before he died, to say goodbye. He works too much, and it had gotten worse since Kiyotaka got sick. It was something I could relate to.”

“To being sick?” A new kind of alarm raises in Mondo’s chest, but Ishi shakes his head again.

“To not seeing his father.” Something is swimming beneath his eyes that looks like discomfort, burning up to the surface. “After all, I have never seen mine.”

* * *

It almost bothers Mondo that Ishi doesn’t just warp the both of them back to his hotel room. He’d needed space before, but now he’s concerned that he’s gotten far too much of it. Ishi didn’t look like he was saying goodbye for the last time – Mondo thinks he’s the type to give fair warning, anyway. He’ll just have to hope it’s not like the last time Ishi disappeared without warning, getting dragged home and chewed out for coming to Mondo’s aid. (_Because he likes me too much._)

Oh.

And there’s one other thing.

Chihiro’s on the phone when Mondo pushes the door open, and so’s Daiya farther back in the room. Michi’s fingers are banging away on her laptop, and he’s sure there’s got to be some kind of story behind that because Chi never lets anyone else touch it. They all look up with panicked eyes when he comes in, shouting his name out of order. Chihiro bolts into his chest, squeezing him tightly around the middle, shaking.

“The fuck have you been, man?” Michi asks, standing up. “You been gone over two days, couldn’t figure out where the hell –“

“Sorry,” Mondo interrupts. He pats Chihiro’s head, hand smoothing down her hair. “I’ll get to that in a sec, I swear. But first – I need the car keys.”

“No way,” Michi snaps. “Ya just got back, there ain’t nowhere you gotta be just yet –“

“I’m not goin’ anywhere,” Mondo says, but he’s looking at Daiya and where the keys hang from his ring finger. “I just gotta get something out of the trunk.”

Daiya’s expressionless, watching him, and Mondo doesn’t know what he’ll do if his brother says no, vibrating just under his skin. But he tosses the keys over Michi’s head, and Mondo’s arm almost knocks into Chihiro’s face when he grabs them. Michi looks betrayed, but Daiya nods at Chihiro and says “Go with ‘im. Make sure he doesn’t bolt.”

He could make some sort of bitter comeback about the vote of confidence, but if that whole thing really was pulled from memories he can’t access…

“Are you going to tell me, at least, why you ran off?” Chihiro hovers around him, arms pulled tight over her chest and shivering in the cold. Mondo doesn’t even notice the temperature, still reeling from his latest adventure in reckless behavior.

“Went to fight a djinn,” he says. He doesn’t look at her, or even at the trunk as he pops it.

“_On your own?!_”

“Yeah, I know, dumb idea but I wanted to clear my head.” It’s still there. The box. The one he always looked over, always saying to Chihiro how it must have contained medical supplies or some of Daiya’s useless, sappy crap from when Mondo was a baby. His brother was always sentimental, and the idea made him so embarrassed he never even gave the thing a proper second look.

But that definitely is his handiwork. And he’s scared to open it.

He feels like he doesn’t have a choice when Chi steps up next to him, staring at the box. And he’s gotta do it sometime, and has to tell her about it sometime and that sometime had better be soon.

…he doesn’t know what kind of a face he’s making. His arms and fingers don’t even remember making the movements to open the box or the first set of letters. They’re not even hand-written – with the exception of the one, on something like a Post-It Note. The rest are all typed, but none of it’s the kind of language Mondo ever has or ever would use. Not unless he went through a major personality change at school.

Whatever that face he’s making is, it’s scaring the hell out of Chihiro. She doesn’t try to read the paper upside down or grab one of the letters for herself, but she taps his knee where he’s sitting in the trunk, eyes wide and terrified, and asks him, “Mondo? What is it?”

It takes him a couple minutes to calm down, closing his eyes and swallowing and moving the page away from his vision so he can’t use it like a shield not to look at anything else. “Chi,” he says, “I think I know why we left.”


End file.
